Introduction to International Law

1
Introduction to International Law
2
Intro

• International Law versus Law
• International Law versus Political Science
• Basic Concepts
• Learning International Law

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International Law versus Law

• Law is a system of social rules usually
  enforced through a set of structured
  institutions.

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International Law versus Law

• Public law" subjects, which relate closely to
  the state (including constitutional,
  administrative and criminal law)
• Private law" subjects (including contract, tort,
  property)

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Example of Law

• First Proposition 10 Commandments by Moses 6,
  Thou Shall Not Kill
• Second Proposition If you kill, you will be
  punished by

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International Law versus Law

• But international law only refers to the first
  proposition

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Example of International Law

• Winners wrote the history.
• Only the defeated will be labeled as war
  criminal.

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International Law versus Law

• International law (public), which involves for
  instance the United Nations, maritime law,
  international criminal law and the Geneva
  conventions.
• International law (private) or conflict of laws,
  which addresses the question of which legal
  jurisdiction cases may be heard in.

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Subtle Difference

• By definition, International private law is still
  the law, since the domestic courts could
  generate the ruling toward the legal case and
  enforce it.

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Example of International Private Law

• It is relatively easier for two locals to file
  divorce. If one of the couple were a foreigner,
  then the foreign law should be considered by
  local court.
• However, it does not mean that foreign country
  has any say in the legal consideration. It is a
  private and foreign individual versus the state
  legal system.
• And the true international law is one legal
  system versus another, or others.

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International Law versus Law

• The key word is still enforcement.
• Although domestic enforcement did not get all the
  bad guys, (most of time, the function of domestic
  law is a lot worse than international law) at
  least bad guys would not claim themselves as
  just, like most of bad states in the history and
  now.

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Example

• The Rape of Nanking
• United States in Iraq

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The Rape of Nanking
14
United States in Iraq
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Intro

• International Law versus Law
• International Law versus Political Science
• Basic Concepts

16
International Law versus Political Science

• Since there is no enforcement in international
  law, all the actions are determined by conflicts,
  struggles, possible consensus, conspiracies, or
  sophisticated calculations.
• So, isnt it the, simply put, POLITICS?

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Basic Concepts

• Politics
• International Politics
• Anarchy
• State
• Realism vs. Liberalism
• International Organization and Institution
• International Law

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Politics

• Oxford Dictionary The art and science of
  government, public life and affairs as
  involving authority and government, activities
  concerned with the acquisition or exercise of
  authority or government,
• Other occasions office/family/couple
• Harold Laswell Who gets what, when, how,
  Authoritative allocation of values,
• Mark Lai Definition Power and goods, their
  competition, compensation, implementation and
  continuation

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International Politics

• Politics among states, level of analysis
• Differences between International Politics and
  Taiwan Politics
• Theoretical boundary between International
  Relations and Domestic Politics Anarchy vs.
  Hierarchy

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Anarchy

• Example If you got a parking ticket just because
  of a broken meter, what would you do?
• Example If Cuba invaded Miami, what would the US
  do?
• Example If you had to go to a bad neighborhood
  with weak police enforcement, what would you
  prepare for this trip?
• Definition No supreme power to govern, no
  overarching power, Self help system
• Anarchy vs. Chaos, Anarchic world still has
  order.
• Value, legal and study system in an anarchic world

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State

• A corporate body exercising or claiming to
  exercise, sovereign political power over a
  particular geographic area. Sovereign power
  implies a monopoly on the legitimate use of
  violence and must be recognized by other
  sovereign states.

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Realism vs. Liberalism
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International Organization and Institution

• International organizations and institutions are
  the cooperative problem solving arrangements and
  activities that states and other actors have put
  into place to deal with various issues and
  problems.
• They include international rules and laws, norms
  or soft law, and structures such as formal
  international intergovernmental organization as
  well as improvised arrangements that provide
  decision-making process, information gathering
  and analytical functions, dispute settlement
  procedures, and operational capabilities for
  managing technical and development assistance
  programs, relief aid, and force deployments.

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International Law

• State as the Main Actor
• The Rule of Game Trying to regulate relations
  among States
• Original Function
• Globalization
• Expanded Function

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State as the Main Actor

• Public international law establishes the
  framework and the criteria for identifying states
  as the principal actors in the international
  legal system.
• Why? Good or bad, Force is the final answer to
  conflict resolution and state is the actor with
  the strongest ability of using force.

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Original Function

• International law deals with the acquisition of
  territory, state immunity and the legal
  responsibility of states in their conduct with
  each other.

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Globalization

• As the world gets smaller, the interaction among
  states dramatically became intense, frequent and
  sometimes complicated.
• Globalization speeded up the growth, created the
  interdependence but also spurred the
  proliferation of negative transactions such as
  terrorism, drug trafficking, and financial
  speculation.
• Most importantly, globalization hampered the
  function and influence of nation state
  governance. Traditional role nation states played
  could not deal with this world anymore.

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Expanded Function

• Legal responsibility of states in their conduct
  with each other.
• War
• Money
• People
• The Earth

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Expanded Function

• Group rights
• The treatment of aliens
• The rights of refugees
• International crimes
• Nationality problems
• Human rights
• Maintenance of international peace and security
• Arms control
• The pacific settlement of disputes
• Regulation of the use of force
• Principles to govern the conduct of hostilities
  and the treatment of prisoners
• Global environment
• International waters
• Outer space
• Global communications
• World trade

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Learning International Law

• Absent a world government, the environment of
  international politics is that of a loose
  anarchy. Observance of the law is voluntary, for
  no superior political authority exists to compel
  obedience.

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Learning International Law

• The truth that international law is not true law
  made the learning of the subject become hazy and
  sometimes cynical.

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Learning International Law

• Believers believed international law would and
  should be the solution for global problems and
  skeptics suspected that international law would
  do any good for currently chaotic nation-state
  world system. However, also this truth made the
  learning of the subject so challenging and
  rewarding.

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Learning International Law

• Through the understanding of international law,
  one could review the theory of international
  relations, scrutinize the regional politics all
  over the world, as well as examine the conflict
  and cooperation between domestic law system and
  the international one.

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Learning International Law

• Simply put, this course will lead students go
  through most of major issues touched in the
  four-years course load and prepare students to
  the thesis writing and further graduate education.